It's Only When I Hit the Ground
by wirewrappedlily
Summary: Gang!AU The 00s are many things, all of them criminal. And when James Bond falls for the only man smart enough to step up to power after M dies, it's only a matter of time until either luck or time runs out. 00Q, don't like don't read. T for now, subject to change without notice.


James Bond is used to gunfire, acrid smoke, the rush of adrenaline, and his very heart choking the life out of him in those instants between taking the leap and landing.

He's used to razorblades and the zing of electricity and his own flesh being the source of that smoke.

So to say that James Bond was used to the situation he was in, while sad, is true; he's very used to it. Has been since he was a kid, even before the 00's picked him up.

However, being in what was technically an international gang that ran the world from the shadows and the silenced shots had afforded him with some small measure of comfort, too.

Q, the unofficial head of the beast since the woman they'd both known as M had died (M for mother; M for murder), was Bond's protection. Q had been brought into the fold to make him obsolete in a way. Q had been brought into the folds between Bond's bedsheets when Q had frankly disregarded that, M's small smile on their backs like a spring sun breaking through the cold. Bond knew she'd meant for him to...broaden his horizons. He knew she wanted him to know exactly what the world was capable of. He'd been shown with Q, but hadn't quite gotten the picture until M died.

Now, Bond was tied up and being tortured and Q performed many miracles, but Bond wasn't sure how he'd perform this one.

After all: American "detention facilities" were meant solely to make their detainees disappear.

Bond had been a distraction given up to the authorities to keep the bastard he was hunting from being put in this very place. It didn't matter, really. Bond wondered what time it was, and knew that that didn't matter, because Q would be pushing a button and launching a missile that would go directly into the bastard's left nostril as soon as he found out-subtlety be damned.

Gun running, assassinations, drug control. Bond knew that Q hadn't ever had the stomach for it; still maybe didn't. Q would bring the empire of their little operation to a close when the time came. And Bond thought that might be rightly so. No one else could do what he and Q did. Bullet and gun; grenade and pin. No one was as good a team as they. When Bond had first wrapped himself around Q, he'd known that the man shuddering and easing into human warmth from ice cold was going to be the making and breaking of James Bond. Q had went lax into Bond like he'd been without air for days, and Bond hadn't known a living person could get so chilled and still be standing.

Bond had had to half-carry Q away from his computers, had ended up curled up with him in the one place no one else in headquarters knew he liked to camp out in on his worst nights. Q hadn't said anything, but had opened up bleary eyes and snuggled deeper into Bond's embrace.

It was strange to think of the peace of that moment when there was no end to the physical pain he was being subjected to. Q was his happy place, he was a tad shamefaced to admit, but it was a wonder he could think of him in a place like this. It was like embedding a diamond in shit.

They were the criminal underbelly, the last stand Queen and country had to being a global power. In the days of Conan Doyle, Q would have been called the Napoleon of crime, but that wasn't fitting. Napoleon had lost. Q never would.

"You know...my real estate agent wife would have done more to find me than your twink has, Mr. Bond." His name was spat with disgust. Bond smirked, not quite the one that Q regularly cursed out, but still infuriating.

There was a gun barrel suddenly pointed at the back of the man's head, and Bond wanted to laugh. "Actually, your real estate agent wife would've been the one to hire the hit on your life had I not caught up to you. Your valedictorian daughter would've wanted to burn your bones for being a bastard and a snake, and your son would have learned all too soon that you are a liar and a cheat and a sick bastard. Now, I may be his twink, but I'm also a king of criminal kings. They don't make them like me. You will release my man from that contraption. Then I'll put a bullet through your skull."

"You look like a bloody avenging angel...sir." Bond chuckled roughly.

"I've killed everyone here for you, James, let's not play office until I stop the bleeding."

Bond groaned as he stood, joints cracking loudly and barely-closed scabs pulling as he moved. Q hoisted him up, shooting blindly as he kissed Bond slow and deep, the last man falling dead to the floor. "Injured?"

"Not at all, not compared to you." Q whispered tightly, harshly. "I had their own electronics kill half of them." Q grinned like a wild cat, his eyes unhinged, black in this light. Bond thought he should be scared of the power inherent in the wraith of the man snug against his side, supporting him. Was everyone willing to kill for those they loved, or was it only them?

Bond groaned as he surfaced from the fog of painkillers and sedatives. Q loved him, respected him, but was an utterly slippery bastard who would do what he needed to, against Bond's wishes, for Bond's own good. Q's bleary eyes turned to him, and Bond's twitching smile beckoned him in.

Bond took in the room as Q stood to climb into bed with him. "You got medical to come home with us?"

Q pushed the blankets on his side of the bed down, climbing in and resting his cheek against Bond's shoulder lightly. "It's amazing what unlimited resources will get you. And I wanted you here more than I could convince myself to drag you there."

"You're good to me sometimes...and then sometimes you let your minions handle my check-in."

"You made me come home and sleep-"

"Did you?"

"Which time?"

Bond didn't want to smile, but he was hurt, in bed with his lover, and slightly stoned. That Q was dodging the question honestly didn't surprise him at all: Q slept just about as well as Bond did when they were apart, and as much as Bond wanted him to, he'd never change. Bond asked silently for a kiss, huffing in relief as Q's long, perpetually-cold limbs rose to enfold him. Q was careful with him (always had been, oddly enough, and Bond figured that probably that was for the fact that before Q, being treated with care wasn't something that happened to James Bond), his lips loose and soft as they kissed his again and again. "I'm going to need you to kiss me for real when I come off this high."

"One of these days, I'm going to set this world to burn and make you come away with me." Q whispered against his lips.

"The job can't last forever." Bond agreed.

But there, in their even, relaxed breaths, there was a silent promise to flutter their eyes closed on visions of the flames the world would spew, _"But we can." _


End file.
